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Black Sabbath insight from Revolver and Rolling Stone

March 3, 2013

Revolver and Rolling Stone give us a little insight, via listening session commentary and band interviews, into what we can expect from the new Black Sabbath album, 13.

“Whatever trepidation we may have is quickly put to rest by the slab of prime Sabbath sorcery that is ‘End of the Beginning,’” wrote Revolver. “Boasting more badass riffs than you can shake a sack of dwarves at, the track only staggers to a close after some eight gloriously demonic minutes, with Iommi’s stump-fingered outro solo leaving a spiral-shaped exclamation point on the proceedings.”

Rolling Stone Magazine adds: “Recorded last fall at the famed L.A. studio with producer Rick Rubin, 13 finds Osbourne, Iommi, bassist Geezer Butler and guest drummer Brad Wilk (of Rage Against the Machine) resurrecting the sludgy, ultra-heavy sound of the early Sabbath records. In another nod to their roots, lumbering tracks like ‘End of the Beginning’ and ‘Age of Reason’ stretch out to as long as eight minutes.”

Rolling Stone continues: “When the time finally came to cut the album, Rubin threw in a wrench of his own. Sitting the band down in his Los Angeles home, he played them their first album, 1970′s brutally primitive Black Sabbath. ‘I wanted to make an album that stood alongside their first four albums,’ Rubin says. ‘The first album wasn’t a straightforward heavy metal record. You could hear the jazz influence, so that was the goal, and to capture that live interaction.’”

RS enlightens that “Although Osbourne describes the new album as ‘Satanic blues,’ Iommi’s illness isn’t the only thing that’s changed about Sabbath. Osbourne admits he is no longer the ‘crazy, raging alcoholic drug addict’ he was during the making of his last Sabbath record, 1978′s Never Say Die. (‘It should’ve been called I Wish I Was Dead,’ he grumbles.)”

And Revolver, which hits newsstands March 19, sums up with this great sentiment from Ozzy himself: “It’s just been an incredible journey,” Osbourne continues. “I never dreamed my life was going to be like this. None of us did. We all burst off into different areas, and then we all came back together. And now we’re a family again.”